How we cite our quotes: All quotations are from Sling Blade.
Quote #4
KARL: I learned to read some. I read the Bible quite a bit. I can't understand all of it, but I reckon I understand a good deal of it. Them stories you and Mama told me, they ain't in there. You ought not done that to your boy. I studied on killing you. I studied about it quite a bit. But I don't reckon there's no need for it if all you're gonna do is sit there in that chair. You'll be dead soon enough. And the world'll be shut of you. You ought not kill my little brother. He ought of had a chance to growed up. He would have had fun sometimes.
Karl appears to have been raised in a fundamentalist household. We're not sure what stories they told him that weren't in the Bible, but it appears they thought that by keeping Karl from reading, he wouldn't learn to read the Bible and question them. Knowledge is power.
Quote #5
KARL: I wanna be baptized.
Even with his mild religious confusion, Karl wants to be baptized. But why? What does he still believe in? To us, it seems like Karl is getting baptized as a safeguard before killing Doyle. Maybe if he's baptized before he does it, his soul will be safe.
Quote #6
KARL: I don't reckon that you have to go with women to be a good daddy to a boy. You been real square dealing with me. Bible says two men ought not lay together. But I bet you the good Lord wouldn't send nobody like you to Hades.
Karl is a kind of Jesus figure, in a way. He considers himself a savior, so it's not surprising that he thinks he can revise the Bible to fit his newfound belief system.